The Revolutionary Cascadian Communist Movement (RCCM) experienced a successful and inspiring International Workers’ Day (a.k.a. May Day) celebration in downtown Portland recently. Over two-thousand people were estimated to have attended the rally and march. Several dozen communist and RCCM flags were handed out to appreciative comrades. We were glad to see several other groups and individuals who showed up with their own communist flags and flyers. There were several strong themes among participants, including anti-war, open borders, anti-fascism, workers’ rights, and internationalism. After several years of attending this event, we noticed that this year there was a substantial increase in interest in our message and in a communist movement in our region.

Later on in the march, the police used a minor disruption from a few individuals in the back of the march as a pretext to launch an indiscriminate attack on all of the peaceful marchers. The police abruptly canceled the march permit in the middle of the march, causing mass confusion as many marchers could not understand the police as they barked unintelligibly through their distorted loudspeaker to clear the streets. As people were struggling to cram onto the sidewalks, the police assaulted the peaceful crowd—including old folks and people with small children and dogs—with tear gas and stun grenades. In a panic, people rushed to find an exit as they coughed and choked. Obviously, the police are more interested in protecting the current power structure than keeping citizens safe.

These disgusting acts from the police are further exacerbated by the lying corporate media who have laughably reported that “Molotov cocktails” were thrown at the police to cause the cancellation of the permit. In contradiction to this ludicrous narrative, absolutely no videos, photos, or eyewitness reports exist of Molotov cocktails being tossed, and there have not been any reports of injured police. On the other hand, many innocent marchers and bystanders were blatantly traumatized by the indiscriminate police violence.

Despite the rude police assault, the RCCM considers this May Day a success. We look forward to working with the many new comrades that we met and collaborating with other groups. Long live Cascadia and Communism!
Red Salute, comrades!
– The Revolutionary Cascadian Communist Movement

Why Communism? An Explanation of the Views of the Revolutionary Cascadian Communist Movement

The world is in crisis. We see widespread poverty, massive environmental destruction, and endless wars and violence. We see the world divided into rich countries and poor countries. We see people struggling to survive despite all the advanced science and technology that exists. There are many millions of people in the world who work under horrific conditions in sweatshops and plantations for very low wages. There are many millions of people in the world who lack access to clean water, proper nutrition, or health services. There is constant imperialist warfare that leaves countries devastated, families broken, lives destroyed. Indigenous peoples are forced off their land by corporate industry. The global ecosystems are threatened with collapse from pollution and over-extraction of resources. The threat of nuclear war remains with more nuclear weapons being produced for possible use in the future. How long can this last? What will the future look like if we continue on this path?

Capitalism is the source of the problem. The private ownership of the means of production allows a small group of people, the capitalist class, to become rich and powerful by exploiting the working class. Production is organized in the interests of the rich, against the interests of the poor. For the sake of profit, capitalism requires constant economic growth. Capitalism’s ever-expanding markets seek wider and cheaper access to resources and labor. This constant expansion of the market is at the expense of the environment, indigenous peoples, workers, and the poor. The wealthy, imperialist nations use their accumulated power to brutalize and rob the poor nations of their land, labor, and resources through political, military, and economic means. Imperialist military force paves the way for corporate exploitation of resources and labor.

It is essential that we break with capitalism and develop a new and better system. We need a system that benefits everyone equally. We need a system that is environmentally sustainable in which technology is used in balance with nature and for the benefit of all. We need a system in which the conditions for poverty and exploitation do not exist, a system in which everyone has access to the necessities of life.

What is communism? What is socialism?

Communism is a theoretical global system that has not yet been achieved in which there is no more systemic oppression, class division, or exploitation. Under communism, the means of production and distribution are collectively organized and managed for the benefit of all, everyone works according to their skills and interests and receives according to their needs, and the state is dismantled because it is no longer necessary. Communism aims to re-establish egalitarian social relations similar to those of ancient communal hunter-gatherer societies, societies which Karl Marx termed “primitive communism.” Communism means total liberation for all of humanity, where private property is abolished and the entire Earth and its resources are considered common heritage to all people.

Socialism is the transition from capitalism to communism. When the working class takes control of the systems of production and distribution away from the capitalists and forms workers’ councils and a workers’ state, socialism has been established. Socialism means, in essence, class struggle. Socialism means real democracy. Socialism is the struggle against oppression and inequality, the struggle to overthrow oppressors and create an equal society.

When someone adopts a political line that runs counter to the idea of class struggle towards communism, it is called “revisionism.” There have been many revisionist socialist regimes, but there have also been some truly revolutionary socialist movements. Mistakes have been made in socialist experiments, but, unlike the goal of capitalism which is to allow a handful of people to gain increasing wealth through greed and exploitation, the real goal of socialism is to reach communism: the liberation of all humanity.

There are too many people today who confuse the terms “socialism” and “communism” without any understanding of what the words actually mean. Capitalism has generated countless lies about communism, its leaders, and its history. Unfortunately, in the confusing atmosphere capitalism has created, these lies are often repeated as truth. Because of this, many people falsely believe that communism means “tyrannical dictatorship.” But it is important to understand the truth. Capitalism means the power of a handful of evil, wealthy exploiters. Communism means the power of the people. This is the truth.

What is Marxism?

Marxism is revolutionary science. Marxism is science applied toward class struggle. Marxism is the analysis of class forces. Marxism is the science of how communism can be achieved through revolution and class struggle against capitalism and oppression.

Karl Marx in the 19th century established a comprehensive theory of revolutionary class struggle towards a classless, stateless society termed communism. Marx identified the primary contradiction in class relations to be the division of society into bourgeois and proletariat, the owners and the workers, the exploiters and the exploited. Marx proposed that the working class should unite, overthrow the bourgeoisie, and establish socialism and then communism. Marxists are social scientists who apply revolutionary class analysis in examining the possibilities for revolutionary organizing. Marxists understand the need for oppressed peoples to unite, organize, and take state power away from the capitalists and imperialists.

The state is an instrument of oppression, a tool for one class to subvert the interests of another class. The capitalist state is a tool for the rich to subvert the interests of the poor. The socialist state is a tool for the poor to subvert the interests of the rich, a tool for the working class to create a world of equality and environmental stability. As long as a region is dominated by capitalist state power, it will be governed in the interests of the capitalists and against the interests of the global masses. The socialist state must be established to protect the development of socialism and communism, as capitalist-imperialism will attempt to destroy any real attempts at socialist revolution. Marxists aim to eliminate the state under communism but understand that until capitalism is dismantled, it is necessary for socialism to maintain state power to defend against capitalism’s attempts to destroy or subvert the revolution.

What is Global Class Analysis?

It is important to keep a global perspective when looking at systemic oppression and structural violence. It is a mistake to view workers in the bourgeois “first” world as part of the same economic class as workers in the proletarian “third” world. One class of people works under brutal sweatshop conditions to produce throw-away goods for the other class. Workers in the wealthy imperialist countries derive a high degree of material privilege from the ongoing super-exploitation of workers in the proletarian exploited countries.

The wealthy, bourgeois countries use their combined political, economic, and military power to subjugate and exploit the masses of the proletarian countries. Imperialist countries like the United States regularly launch bombing campaigns and ground invasions in addition to supporting terrorists and proxy armies against independent regimes in the proletarian world. Overthrowing and replacing governments with comprador puppet regimes aligned with imperialism is standard procedure for global capitalism.

Through imperialism, the masses of the wealthy imperialist countries receive much higher wages and consume much more in terms of energy and resources than the masses of the proletarian exploited countries. Workers in the wealthy countries produce very little compared to the large amount they consume. The proletarian world is the cheapest source of labor, so the bulk of manufacturing is conducted there as it is more profitable to the capitalists. Despite a lack of manufacturing jobs, workers in the rich imperialist countries are kept employed through the service and retail industries, receiving more in wages than the value of what they produce on the global market. This extra value received by these privileged workers is derived from the ongoing super-exploitation of workers in the proletarian countries.

Due to this bourgeois imperial privilege, the workers of the bourgeois countries largely support the capitalist-imperialist system and cannot currently be considered a class ally of the proletarian masses. Correct global class analysis acknowledges the significance of this political and economic divide between the rich imperialist countries and the proletarian exploited countries in regard to the possibilities for effective revolutionary organizing. It is a mistake to try to reform capitalism or to focus only on improving life in the wealthy countries. The only solution to the problems of global poverty, exploitation, and environmental destruction is to build socialism where the conditions support it, in the proletarian world.

How does socialism relate to protecting the environment?

Capitalism’s primary purpose is to maximize profit for the capitalists. Capitalism considers everyone and everything a commodity with a market value. Life itself is not valued under capitalism. Capitalism seeks ever-expanding markets, acting as a cancer upon the Earth. As resource extraction is necessary for production of goods, the environment is destroyed at an accelerating rate for corporate profit. The global ecosystems on which humanity depends for survival are collapsing.

People must struggle not just for the liberation of humanity from oppression but also to defend the natural environment from destruction. Socialism should be established not only to liberate the oppressed masses, but to protect and rehabilitate what is left of the planet’s ecosystems. The environment should be considered common heritage to all, not a commodity to be used and abused for profit under capitalism. Under socialism, systems of production and distribution are organized for the benefit of all, which necessarily means that these systems of production and distribution are organized to protect the natural environment upon which all humans depend for their survival and well-being.

As long as capitalism remains the dominant mode of production, the destruction of the environment will accelerate. This environmental destruction must be viewed as a systemic issue through the lens of global class analysis if real progress is to be made in halting the destruction of global ecosystems. Only by reorganizing the means of production and distribution for the benefit of all humans and the environment can the environmental crisis be mitigated. Only by establishing socialism can a healthy, peaceful world come into existence.

What does socialism offer women?

Women today suffer from various forms of patriarchy across the world. Traditional patriarchal oppression is more commonplace in the proletarian world, where women are often viewed as property of their husbands and subjected to traditional forms of abuse or servitude, while neo-patriarchal oppression is the trend within the bourgeois world. Under neo-patriarchy, women are falsely portrayed as “liberated” although still forced into a subjugated role by society. Capitalist propaganda frequently portrays women in hypersexualized or subservient roles, perpetuating rape culture and maintaining the patriarchal status quo while touting it as some kind of liberal “feminism.”

Only socialism can end class exploitation and remove the conditions in which women and children are trafficked and abused. Only socialism can offer women true social equality with men by ending the economic basis for their oppression and exploitation. The end of rape culture willonly be achieved when women are treated with equal dignity and respect as men, which necessarily requires socialism because only socialism offers the possibility of ending the objectification and commodification of women’s bodies.Capitalism offers the opposite of socialism in terms of the treatment of women. Capitalism requires the subjugation of womenwithin the existing patriarchal class structure and their subservience to men.Socialism, on the other hand, offers women actual liberation from patriarchy.

Most of the world’s women live in the proletarian world. Besides high rates of sexual abuse, many women in the poor countries also experience terrible working conditions, very low income, poor medical care, and social chauvinism and marginalization. Although women in the wealthy countriesalso experience oppression and elevated rates of sexual abuse under capitalism, there is a huge difference in the quality of life between women in the bourgeois world and women in the proletarian world. Women in the wealthy imperialist countries spend lots of money on needless consumer goods likefashion clothing and electronic gadgets while proletarian women in the exploited countries endlessly toilin sweatshops producing these items for very low wages. Like the men of the wealthy countries, the women also gain economic privilege from the global capitalist system which oppresses and exploits women and men in the proletarian countries.All women will benefit greatly from socialism, but it will necessarily involve a significant reduction in material consumption for thewomen and men of the bourgeois world.

The only true feminism is revolutionary proletarian internationalist feminism, whichtakes into account global class relations and the real material conditions for the oppression and exploitation of women. Women have played a major role in all successful social revolutions, and historical socialist experiments have proven not only that socialism benefits women greatly, but that women are an essential part of the revolution.

What is the Revolutionary Cascadian Communist Movement?

Only with scientific leadership will the working class be able to topple capitalism and establish socialism. The rich capitalists use the most advanced science they have to control and suppress the working class; therefore, the working class must use the most advanced science available to fight back. RCCMis a movement that uses the most advanced, up-to-date Marxist political theory to enable the oppressed global masses to organize themselves to fight and defeat global capitalism. We have comrades around the world who are working to build a better world, and they need our help.

RCCM is a movement for those who are dedicated to humanity, to the Earth, to life. RCCM is for those who are disciplined, intelligent, hard-working, andwilling to fight for a better world.

RCCM calls on those in the bourgeois world to become class traitors, to turn against the capitalist-imperialist system and against their own blood-soaked privilege, to join with the proletarianmasses in overthrowing global capitalism and creating socialism and freedom for all.

If you are interested in RCCMor would like to get involved, email us at: